Kong

I wasn’t sure how I felt about the new gamer card feature for the 360. I got this mail in my inbox though and I have to admit I think it’s pretty cool.

Hi Gabe, I see you finished Kong.. I’ll take that as an endorsement, as in you liked it? I found the demo to be nice looking, but the controls seemed lacking. Maybe I just didn’t know what I was doing, does it take some getting used to?

Cheers,

It’s true I did finally beat Kong a few nights ago. You can definitely take that as an endorsement. In my opinion it’s easily the best launch game for the 360 and one of the most beautiful games I’ve ever seen. There were times in Kong where I felt like I was moving through one of the concept paintings for the film. Towards the end of the game especially there are some absolutely jaw dropping visuals.

The game does have its problems though. Parts of Kong are ridiculously dark. Occasionally I found myself bumping into walls over and over again madly trying to find where the game wanted me to go next. The other problem is the ending. I honestly didn’t think I was spoiling anything for Tycho when I told him Kong died. Like the comic says, this story is more than 70 years old. I feel like the game should have ended with Kong’s capture on the island. When you die in a videogame you lose. Making you play his death scene rather than just watch it is a huge problem. Letting you play it implies you have some control over the outcome but that isn’t the case. No amount of mad button mashing skillz will save Kong from his destiny. You essentially end the game by losing which I found extremely unsatisfying.

I wanted to beat Kong so that I could get started on Prince of Persia the Two Thrones. I figured if I had Kong out of the way I could really focus on POP. Unfortunately POP does not work on the 360. I actually gave away my old Xbox so I’m pretty much shit out of luck until they decide to release a patch. If you ask me MS really dropped the ball with the 360’s limited backwards compatibility. Having more games available to play at the system’s launch could only have helped people’s impression of the 360.